James hunter annandale



No, 625,3H. Patented May 23, 1899. J. H. ANNANDALE.

` APPARATUSAFUR DISINTEGRATING AND WASHING BAGS.

(Application led Dec. 21, 1897.)

(No Model.)

lJNrTED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

JAMES HUNTER ANNANDALE, OF BOLTON, SCOTLAND.

APPARATUS FOR DlSlNTEGRATING AND WASHING RAGS.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 625,311, dated May 23, 1899.

Application filed December 21,1897. Serial No. 662,859. (N0 model.)

To all wtont t 77u03/ concern:

Be it known that I, JAMES HUNTER ANNAN- DALE, paper manufacturer, of Polton Paper VVorks, Polton, Mid Lothian county, Scotland, have invented a certain new and useful Improved Apparatus for Disintegrating and Vashing Rags or other Fibrous Material for the Manufacture of Paper, (which has been patented in Great Britain by Letters Patent dated December 3l, 1896,No. 30,103,) of which the following is a specication.

This invention has for its object to economize time, space, and power and to effect a large saving of water in the process of-disintegratin g and washing rags and similar iibrous materials for the manufacture of paper.

The invention is illustrated by the accompanyin g drawings,Figu re l being a transverse vertical section of the improved disintegrating apparatus, and Fig. 2 a longitudinal section of the same.

The process as hitherto conducted has been effected intermittently by the use of a number of Hollanders or similar engines, which occupy considerable space and absorb great power and in which the operation has to be periodically stopped and the tanks emptied, while the volume of water required in washing is very large, owing in great measure to the mode commonly adopted of feeding in a stream of clean water into the large body of polluted water in the machine and simultaneously draining off the mixed water. According to the present invention the disintegrating and washing processes are rendered continuous by the use of improved apparatus in which the material after disintegration is subjected to successive washings in water of increasing purity, the waste water from each washing being used for an earlier stage of the washing process.

The rags or other brous material, preferably after preliminary cleansingin a rag washing or brushing machine to remove the grosser impurities, are fed with water through a hopper A' into the improved disintegrating apparatus A, hereinafter described, and in which they are reduced into coarse pulp by means of a toothed roll B, rapidly rotated within a toothed casing O and delivered into a tank or vessel D. The rags or other fibrous materials may be passed through two or more disintegrators arranged to gradually disintegrate the material, in which case the preliminary washing or cleansing of the rags may be effected in the first of the series of disintegrators instead of in a separate machine, the object of the preliminary washing being to avoid forcing the dirt into the fiber. From the tank D, receiving the rags reduced to pulp from the disintegrator A, the pulp is discharged by gravitation or by means of pumps or otherwise by way of a pipe D'.

The improved disintegrator A is composed of a cylindrical or conical toothed beater-roll or serrated cutter B or series of cutters secured upon a rotating shaft B and adapted to revolve in contact with a cutter-casing C or stationary cutter plates or beds wholly or partially encircling the rotating cutters B and between which cutters the rags or other fibrous materials are fed in with water, as already mentioned, from a hopper A' at one end and after disintegration are delivered at the opposite end.

The rotating cutters B are made up of a number of bevel-edged disks strung together and secured upon the shaft B', or they may be formed by a single roll of steel or other hard material having a number of V-shaped or other grooves B2 cut oircumferentially around it, so as to leave sharp edges which are cut across to form a number of saw-like teeth B3 on each ridge. The grooves and ridges are by preference made of graduallydecreasing width and depth from the feedingin to the outlet end, and the teeth formed in them are made of gradually-decreasing pitch in the like sense. The disks comprising the cutter-roll are so arranged upon the shaft in relation to each other that the teeth of the disk having the smaller pitch appear between the .teeth of the adjacent disk having the greater pitch, as shown at Fig. l. The cutters B in the stationary bed or encircling casing O are formed in like manner of toothed grooves and ridges, so that the sides of the ridges of the rotating cutters B bear on the sides of those of the stationary cutters C, and the teeth of the former during the rotation impinge on or are brought into close contact with those of the stationary cutters C. The rags or other fibrous materials enter between the wider-spaced teeth at the feeding-in end,

IOO

being guided thereinto by suitable scooping, as at N, or beveling of the roll in front of and between the rows of teeth at that end, and they are gradually and thoroughly disintegrated in their passage through the gradually-lessening spaces between the cutters. The advantage of the gradation of the cutters B at the feeding-in end is that the coarse masses of fibrous stuff find easy entrance into the iiner teeth, which are relieved of strain. The coarse teeth comb out and reduce the fiber and render the work of the finer teeth both easier and more nearly perfect.

The teeth of the casing orstationary cutters C may be iitted to movable plates, which can be moved closer to the roll or series of rotating cutters till they come in contact, if need be. The teeth are set, respectively, on the roll and plate to exactly fit each other, so that nothing can escape pulverization, but they may be spaced in the circumference to allow of the passage of the ber.

At the feeding-in end of the rotating beater roll or cutter a scooped cone O is attached, on which are one or more serrated wipers or bars P, and the casing on the low side, which is practically the bottom of the feed-hopper A', has also bars Q, so that the fibrous mass in passing between them is brushed out and prepared to more easily enter the teeth.

In the operation of the disintegrating apparatus the fiber fed with a supply of water by the feed-hopper A is distributed by the wipers P of the cone O and delivered partly by circulation and flow of water and partly by the action of the cone into the teeth, where it is speedily disintegrated by their tearing action into a ine regular fiber.

Having now described the invention, what I claim, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is-

l. In combination with the casing, having the inlet A', the teeth in the casing, the

toothed beater-roll in the casing acting in connection therewith, said beater roll being scooped from its base toward its apex, substantially as described.

2. In combination, the casing having the teeth, the rotary toothed beater-roll, a cone at the feeding end of the roll scooped at O, from its base toward its apex, the wiper-bars P thereon extending from the base toward the apex and the bars Q in the casing, substantially as described.

Signed at Glasgow, in the county of Lanark, Scotland, this 1st day of December, 1897.

JAMES HUNTER ANNANDALE.

IVitnesses:

VALLACE FAIRWEATHER, J No. ARMSTRONG, J r. 

